INTERVIEW WITH JACKIE SONNENBERG

Your work exists at the intersection of writing and live horror performance. How does physically embodying fear change the way you write it on the page?

For me, this is where character development really comes into play and it is something I get to play with as a horror actor. I’m in costume, I’m in character,  and I am in the setting of the environment where that character comes from. And it is all  improvising ,whether in a short and specific scene or a wide-range environment, so it is all me and what I can conjure from the setting. Who is the character? What are they doing? What do they want? Also, are they good or bad? I do the same when developing my characters in my books. I make their situations and their problems realistic in relation to their environment and all the decisions they make whether they be good or bad or somewhere in between. Especially their relationships with other characters.

Your stories often carry a visual, almost cinematic quality. Do you “see” your scenes first, or do they emerge through the writing process?

I definitely “see” them. I’m pretty visual. I want to get the details of everything in the room or area, whether they be indoors or outdoors. You have to appeal to all the senses to make it real and make the readers feel like they’re there. That dirty mug of leftover coffee on the table? It’s probably cold and smells stale, and there might be a stain or two on the table. Outside in the pitch black night, unable to see anything? Probably feeling a cool breeze, and hearing something shuffle in the grass.

The Fathoms Below suggests something vast and unknowable. What drew you to that kind of horror—depth, pressure, isolation—and what does it represent to you personally?

The ocean is the biggest mystery of all. We can play with stories in dark forests and abandoned buildings, but most of the time we know what is there or what is possibly going to be there. Eventually that forest ends and we can exit the building, but not so much the ocean. It is vast, and it is alive, and we only know a small portion of it. What don’t we know? This has been one of my favorite themes to work with, which is why this book counts as a science-fiction and a fantasy. I did research on real things in the ocean, and at the same time, I got to invent my own. It’s a series I am developing and can’t wait to show readers where else this is going.

You’ve played with twisted, almost nursery rhyme-like horror in past work. What is it about innocence corrupted that continues to pull you back?

People like what they know, and what they know to be a comfort like our childhood bedtime stories. But, when those comforts turn into dangers, it changes that all of a sudden. I centered a standalone collection (still and always going to grow) taking those classic tales and twisting them enough to give them the classic they think they know and showing them how it is not. I like to say that there is more going on between the lines, the tagline for that collection “There are some things Mother Goose left out.” Mary brought her lamb to school, but, is the lamb a cute pet… or a dangerous beast?

How has your background in journalism shaped your discipline or structure as a fiction writer?

Number one: Research. Of course the best part of fiction of course is to just make things up and create your universe the way you want it, but you also have to incorporate real things in there. My work with FATHOMS definitely needed that. I spent time on Youtube watching videos of the ocean and ocean creatures to see how they moved and what they looked like, and read articles to give me descriptions of other things. 

Number two: Deadlines. We all know articles are much shorter than novels and can easily be done in a few days tops, but it’s still adhering to a date and time when something should be finished even if it is the long run. Here, you can treat chapters like individual articles and set yourself smaller goals within the large one.

Indie horror often demands constant reinvention and visibility. What has been your most effective way of connecting with readers in such a saturated space?

Oh, horror. It’s such a difficult genre to maintain, isn’t it? It can be niche and it can draw a particular audience, but still feels rather limited. Not everyone can do horror. Not everyone has the same definition of what scary is. I have read some horror books where I could tell the author was trying too hard to be scary. It was loads of gore and too much action and killing, one after the other with no direction. At that point it’s just descriptions and no story. I worried that my dabble with horror would mean that it would have to be the “right” kind of scary for each reader in order for it to be good, or it would not be good at all. I told myself I didn’t want to have that problem. That is why I am such an advocate for genre blending because I want to be scary and I want to be more that comes with that. I have grown into and fallen in love with speculative, fantasy horror and for that reason. I get to be imaginative but make it dark and play with themes I really like all in the category of monsters, creatures, spirits, and more. I want the dark side of the imagination, and it can go in whatever direction I want. 

When readers finish one of your stories, what do you want to linger with them? The fear itself, or something deeper beyond it?

I want my readers to imagine themselves in the story, what they would do if they were one of the characters, or if they were friends with the main character. People follow along with them and are their friend from page one, most of the time. They want to see them survive. Would you tell them not to go in the woods? Don’t chase the monster? Don’t go anywhere alone? I want characters people will root for, will cringe when they read them doing something stupid and dangerous, or when they’re naive to something the readers already learned. I want them to care about them and the worlds they live in enough to want to visit them again. When people read my work I want them to imagine those worlds the characters live in, all the good and bad and terrifying and beautiful. Yes, it would be amazing to breathe under water and dive deep in the ocean and swim with a tail, but, something might  appear out of the darkness and want to eat you.

“Bringing characters to life on paper, and in person.”

http://www.jackiesonnenberg.com/index.htmlhttps://www.facebook.com/AuthorJackieSonnenberg

Twitter and Instagram: @sonnenbooks

PLEASE NOTE: The views and opinions of the staff of Memento Mori Ink do not necessarily represent those of Memento Mori Ink or Crystal Lake Publishing. Thank you for understanding.